Yahoo To Focus More On Local, How Long Till It Gets To UK?

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So yahoo has a new CEO, she’s likley to focus on Yahoo!Local. What do you say to that? I know that I’m not overly concerned this way or that. 91% of seach market is still dominated by Google here in the UK. It is also still very very difficult to get your business onto Yahoo!Local in the UK, well not difficult as such but you have to pay for the priviledge. And, then when there is a mistake, and there unfortunately always seems to be it is a nightmare to put right right.

Given where things stand at Yahoo! Local today, what changes might we expect for the offering with Mayer at the helm, and how will that affect your local business?

Mayer’s first directive may be to build out Yahoo! Local listings to allow businesses and users to add much more content ranging from menus to videos – while eliminating the current paid barrier. Local businesses will need to create new content or repurpose existing content from their listings elsewhere to build out their Yahoo! Local profiles.

Mayer might team up with a popular local search site (she is an active Foursquare user) to integrate more reviews, deals and social media features. Mayer said at the time of Google’s acquisition of Zagat that “getting local search right is important, and to do that you need great reviews.”

Given her role launching Google+ Local, Mayer also understands how important integrating social media into the local search experience will be for Yahoo! Local to be successful. It will be important to watch what partnerships come to be with Mayer in charge and how that impacts your local marketing plan.

While Yahoo maintains nearly the same number of business listings as a competitor like Yelp (17 million vs. 19 million, respectively), Mayer’s commitment at Google to create “pages for all known places” might be a goal for Yahoo! Local. Yahoo may incentivize businesses to add or claim their listings, giving your local business a nice bonus for participating.

Mayer would likely significantly build out the currently limited Yahoo! Local mobile experience. Mayer knows that mobile is the next big thing in local: she recently discussed how 50% of usage for Google Maps comes from mobile devices, so she knows where that opportunity lies there. Mayer may focus on leveraging features like geo-targeted ads and augmented reality in ways that give Yahoo! Local a leg up on the competition. If so, your local business should evaluate the offerings and see if it makes sense to buy in to some of them.

I think many of us would agree that Yahoo! Local (and frankly, all of Yahoo) would benefit from a visual makeover. Right now, the site lacks the clean and streamlined design that many credit Mayer for championing at Google. We might expect Mayer to lead a major redesign of Yahoo that would extend into local – new colors, fonts, graphics, etc. – and vastly improve the ability of businesses to share content and users to find it.

Having designed and developed Google’s search interface, Mayer may take a look at Yahoo! Local search and make some changes. An interesting concept that Mayer has discussed is her work on “contextual discovery” – or in her words, “search without search.” Mayer thinks there are ways to take one’s history, location and context to present interesting and unexpected results tailored to the individual. It will be interesting to see if Mayer finds ways to turn that thinking into action to Yahoo! Local, and important for businesses to ensure they use the right keywords to get found by the right consumers in their searches.

If Yahoo! Local improves, it would provide your business with access to an older and wealthier demographic. According to Nielsen data provided by our friends at Bing, more than 30% of Bing/Yahoo! searches come from users in the 55+ age demographic, and more than 20% have household incomes greater than $100,000….More at Will The New Yahoo CEO Focus On Local Businesses? – Search Engine Land

I’ll let you make up your own minds. After reading that, I can tell you that i will be doing some extra things for my US based clients, lets face it theres a market there. However, I will not be testing any strategies for the UK yet. Time is money, and I feel that time testing would be wasted here…